Williams Easily Wins 100 Meters

Lauryn Williams ran away with the women’s 100-meter title at the NCAA track and field championships Friday night, winning in 10.96 seconds -- the fastest time in the world this year.

The 5-foot, 3-inch junior from Miami, who talks almost as fast as she runs, bettered her 11.01 clocking, which had stood as the world’s best this season. She also had a wind-aided 10.94-second time in Thursday’s preliminaries, the fastest time under any conditions this year.

“It’s better than stupendous, better than great,” she said of her races on the Mike A. Myers Stadium track. “I’ve got to make up my own word for how it went.”

Williams, who said she “got my fast talking from my mother and my fast running from my dad,” was never in any serious trouble. Muna Lee of Louisiana State was a distant second at 11.12, with Texas freshman Marshevet Hooker third at 11.23.

Tyson Gay gave defending champion Arkansas its first men’s 100-meter title, winning in 10.06 seconds. Michael Frater of Texas Christian was second, also in 10.06.

“It’s pretty special,” Gay said. “I could have gone to any school that was a sprint school. Now I feel Arkansas is named as a ‘sprint-slash-distance’ school.”

Favored Arkansas led the men’s competition after six events with 25 points. Florida was second with 23, followed by TCU with 18 and SMU with 16.

After nine events, Nebraska had 38 points in the women’s race. UCLA was second with 34, defending champion LSU third with 31 and host Texas fourth with 21.

UCLA, LSU and Texas are expected to fight it out for the team title in today’s final day of competition.